ASU women’s basketball hopes to turn up defensive pressure on road

After wrapping up its afternoon practice on Saturday, Arizona State broke the huddle on, “One, two, three, road warriors.” That’s not a love of the first of the Mad Max films, but an acknowledgment of the tough closing stretch the Sun Devils face.

Five of ASU’s final seven games are on the road, beginning with a trip to Tucson Sunday to face rival Arizona for the second time in as many games. They follow that with a tough trip to the Bay Area to face No. 3 Stanford and No. 23 California next weekend, then return home for games against Colorado and Utah before hitting both Oregon and Oregon State on the road to end the regular season.

“We’ve just got to woman-up,” ASU coach Charli Turner Thorne said. “I always talk about toughness this time of year. Obviously in March, that’s what wins. We always use February as OK, might as well start getting ready for March. We’re really going to get tested, obviously.”

If the No. 11 Sun Devils (20-3, 9-2 in the Pac-12) are to have success on this closing slate, which could go a long way in determining NCAA Tournament positioning, they’ll need more defensive efforts like their second half against the Wildcats (4-18, 0-11) on Tuesday. In that game, ASU entered halftime with the score tied 26-26 but held UA to 10 second-half points, including just two in the final 11:30 for a 60-36 win.

It was a refreshing performance from a team that had struggled to put teams away. Each of the Sun Devils’ past four wins were one-possession games, and they hadn’t held a team to their goal of less than 56 points since an 81-55 win over Cal State-Fullerton on Dec. 14.

“We just have to play team defense,” freshman post Kelsey Moos said. “When our help side is there and we keep people in front of us and finish with good box outs, we play great team defense. We just have to keep being consistent with that. Instead of doing it for one half, keep doing it every half for the rest of our games from here on out.”

It’s odd that playing 40 minutes of strong defense is an issue at all given ASU’s recent history. In its past five winning seasons — 2007-08 through 2011-12 — the Sun Devils never have held opponents to worse than 42.1 percent shooting and 59.8 points a game. This season, those numbers are 42.7 percent and 65.4.

As to why, one theory is that the Sun Devils are more offensively talented than in past years, allowing them to compete better in scoring battles. More offensive talent also means more time committed to the offensive side of things, at the expense of defense. Entering the backstretch of the season, ASU would like to find a better balance.

“We have a lot of good scorers,” senior Joy Burke said. “It’s just bringing that defensive mentality. There are certain teams that I’ve been on during my five years at ASU where we did have the defensive focus. We called ourselves a defensive team.”

That effort starts — or continues — with the Wildcats. The nature of the game could be very different than on Tuesday, though. Both teams have had four days to prepare, meaning fresh memories for making adjustments and fixing miscues.

“We might do some things differently, they might do some things differently,” Turner Thorne said. “It’s a little bit of a chess match in that regard, because both of us have had time to do some different things.”

Sunday’s game

No. 11 Arizona State at Arizona

When: 1 p.m.

Where: McKale Center.

TV/radio: Pac-12 Arizona/KDUS-AM (1060).

ASU update: ASU (20-3, 9-2 Pac-12) just beat the Wildcats by 24, UA’s biggest defeat since a 96-52 loss to Stanford on Jan. 7. Beginning with this game, five of the Sun Devils’ last seven are on the road. Two of ASU’s three losses have come on the road. A difficult trip to California and Stanford — both ranked — looms on the horizon.

UA update: Three of UA’s four wins have come at the McKale Center. The Wildcats (4-18, 0-11) will be playing their second game of a four-game stretch against ranked teams, with contests against Cal and Stanford to follow. The 36 points they managed Tuesday against ASU was their lowest output of the season.

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